Playing Princess

Part Seven: Jostling the Jealous Jerk

Part Seven: Jostling the Jealous Jerk

The next day, science class proved to be a lot more interesting than usual. Naturally, my sudden interest had nothing to do with the actual lesson and everything to do with the two and a half people that were glaring holes into my back.

I say two and a half because while he wasn't exactly able to glare at me from the front of the classroom, I could feel hatred radiating off of Prince. Whether the hatred was just from our last incident in science class or him having seen me in his house yesterday, I couldn't say.

The glares from Quinn and Damon, though, I knew exactly what those were about. The two of them were standing as far apart as was humanly possible. And it was my fault.

Technically, their sort-of break-up should have meant that I won the bet but according to Damon, the bet hadn't even started yet since I wasn't dating Prince.

To which I, of course, replied by launching into a play-by-play account of the amazing time I had at Prince's house yesterday.

He listened to my story with a skeptic ear and asked question after question. Eventually, my lies ran out and I had to confess that I told Quinn about the bet.

Damon was pretty angry. He called Quinn at least three times, pacing around my room. After she sent him to voicemail every time, he sent me a withering glare and climbed out of my window.

This morning, he didn't say anything when he drove me to school. He honked his horn once to let me know he was ready and then blared rap music that he knew I hated the entire ride.

The teacher droned on and on about who knows what. Unfortunately, we were supposed to be finishing our labs from Friday, which meant that I had to go back and work with Prince.

I took a deep breath and started towards his table at the front, but someone beat me there.

What the heck is she doing?

I watched with shock as Quinn slid herself into his lab table. She started talking about some science thing that I didn't understand. And then she gave a little hair flip.

Prince looked slightly confused, but he turned and saw Damon standing next to me. A look of relief washed over his face, because he probably assumed that Damon and I were going to be partners.

Which, I guess we were now. He glared at me and I glared back. We stood in silence at the lab table for a minute.

"I can, like, go get the supplies?" I offered, hoping to break up the silence.

"Don't bother," he shrugged past me. He stomped around the room gathering the hydrogen tubes and such.

Prince reached for a pair of safety goggles and Damon literally snatched them from his hand and stomped away. Prince didn't even flinch, and I felt a pang of sympathy for him as he calmly grabbed a different pair of goggles. It made me sad to think that he was used to that kind of thing.

Damon returned with the supplies and I reached for the tubes but he pushed them away from me.

"I don't need your help," he snapped. "I'll do the lab myself and then make you a copy."

If I was being honest, that was a pretty fantastic deal. Of course, I would have have to change a few of his answers because the teacher would be suspicious if I got everything right, but other than that I couldn't complain.

Don't worry, though. I still complained.

"Come on, Damon," I said. "If you actually liked Quinn, you'd be trying to talk to her right now instead of avoiding her like the plague."

He stopped working and for a second I believed that I had actually gotten through to him until he turned to me and said, "You know, you're not really in a position to be giving relationship advice, seeing as your so-called 'boyfriend' currently has his feet wrapped up in eight pounds of bandages thanks to you."

Unconsciously, my eyes trailed to Prince's feet. His preppy Sperrys were bulgy and there were ace bandages peeking out of the tops of his feet.

I winced but looked away. I still wasn't sure if he had seen me in his house or not, and I didn't think that apologizing to someone as rude as him was worth finding out.

Quinn caught Damon and I looking over at her table. Actually, we were just looking at Prince's feet, but she seemed to think she had won somehow.

She winked to us and then spouted some science-y things that I didn't understand, but seemed to impress Prince and make Damon angry.

"Let's get to work," Damon said harshly. I bit my lip and followed his lead, writing down whatever he told me to.

After about 15 minutes, there was a ruckus from the front of the classroom and Damon and I looked up.

Prince had knocked his pencil pouch full of supplies onto the ground and everything had fallen out. Quinn was taking this opportunity to pick his stuff up for him.

She turned and made eye contact with Damon and then handed Prince's stuff back to him, letting her hand linger for a second longer than it should have.

By this point, Damon was taking large breaths through his nose and his anger was palpable.

Five seconds later, Quinn was giggling like an idiot and even Prince had cracked a smile. Damon finally snapped and did the last thing that I would expect him to do.

He kissed me.